Perchance to Dream
by NearlyHuman
Summary: Trapped in a strange world of chess boards and playing cards, surrounded by mad people and haunted by a large, foreboding creature.  Honestly if a rodent of any hue starts talking to him, he's going to loose it.  And could the Master stop grinning?


**Author's Notes:** _So this started life as a 5 story and was inspired by these great illustrations .com / #cutid1 though this story is NOT slash I couldn't help thinking it would be fun to see a 'Doctor in Wonderland' type story, and of course 5 with his innocent and rather she persona would make a great Alice parody. However, as I started writing I found that really, with how I wanted the story to evolve, this was going to have to be a 10 story. So here it is, part one of my rather mad and rambling little adventure. I hope you enjoy and let me know if my efforts have been worth while or not._

**Disclaimer:**_ I don't own Doctor Who or the Alice stories. They belong to the BBC and Lewis Carroll respectively. This is true for every chapter of this story._

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><p>To sleep, perchance to dream – ay, there's the rub:<br>For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,  
>When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,<br>Must give us pause – there's the respect  
>That makes calamity of so long life.<p>

-From Hamlet, Shakespeare

1.

He became aware that he was standing... Somewhere. It was the only thought he could give to his current surroundings that seemed appropriate. He was 'Somewhere', with a capital 'S'. The ground he was standing on was a black and white tiled floor that gave the impression he was standing on a giant chess board. To the sides were the crumbled remains of stone walls and arches and beyond that... Nothing. Nothing as far as the eye could see. No trees, no horizon, no sky, not even darkness because that would be Something, but no. Here he was standing on a floor in the middle of, Nothing.

His brow furrowed as he tried to remember how he came to be standing here, but the memory eluded him. As he thought he licked his lips and turned around slowly, seeing if there was anything that could give him a clue or jog his memory. Perhaps he was in a dream, but if he was this would all seem normal and anyway if he told himself he was dreaming he would wake up. As he didn't seem any closer to consciousness he felt there was a good chance he wasn't asleep. Or at least, he wasn't having a normal sleep.

He could hear a deep rumbling far off in the distance, too far to have an idea of what it could be. This was followed by a faint chuckle. The Doctor, for that was how he was known, frowned at that. He knew that chuckle and he didn't like it, not at all.

These sounds however were forgotten, or at least temporarily misplaced, when he noticed a flight of stairs leading upwards behind him, the top of which held a wooden door. It was perhaps one of the Doctors greatest failings that he was somewhat insatiably curious which in this case resulted in him turning the rest of his body around and manoeuvring it over to the stairs. There was no hand rail and the steps were also tiled in the same checker pattern as the floor below.

As he climbed he thought he could hear a steady 4 beat rhythm, low and base and just on the edge of hearing. The higher he climbed, the louder it became until he stopped, a chill creeping up his spine. A low rumbling sound followed, the same sound from before but louder and more distinct this time. It sounded like a large animal letting itself known to the world in general. As the roar faded a soft yet snide voice spoke into his ear,

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son! The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!" followed by that chillingly familiar chuckle.

He took an irritated breath and finished his climb. As he reached the top the Doctor placed his hand on the door knob and paused for a moment, wondering if it might have a few glib remarks of its own to say. When it didn't he turned it and opened the door to find himself looking down a long corridor with stone walls and floor and paintings lining the walls. Right down the end stood a large wooden door.

Now, most people would probably be somewhat surprised by this event. After all the door, when seen from the outside, looked like it lead into the Nowhere, that there would be an uncertain drop awaiting the rash. The fact that there wasn't didn't faze the Doctor at all, however. The Doctor was actually a Timelord, an ancient race that had perfected the means of time travel and excelled in temporal physics. The Doctor's own time machine, a seemingly small blue police box was in fact much, much larger on the inside then out. So the fact that there was a corridor on the other side of a door that, for all intense and purposes shouldn't exist, really didn't worry the Doctor's senses at all.

Besides, he was quite certain this place didn't really exist. And a lot of very unorthodox things can happen in a place that doesn't really exist.

He stepped into the hall and peered at the first painting to his right. It was of his Granddaughter, Susan, smiling and looking like a sixteen year old girl. He smiled fondly and not a little bit sadly at the painting. Many, many centuries ago now he had stolen his time machine to see the stars and Susan had come with him. She had been just a child by Gallifreyan standards, as excited to see the universe as much and he had been and willing to follow him on his adventures through time and space. He had often wondered however, if he had done the right thing by her. Exposing her to all sorts of dangers and hazards and dragging her away from her home before she could finish her training. He remembered how, in the end, she had wanted a place to call home and feel like she belonged. She smiled back at him now from the canvas, just as she had during their first adventures, with her first and oh so young and innocent face.

He reached out sadly and lightly brushed her painted cheek with his figure tips before looking to the next painting.

This one was of a young man, a face he hadn't seen or even thought of for a long time now. But he remembered him, Ian Chesterton science teacher at Coal Hill School. He and Barbara Wright, a history teacher from the same school and who was occupying the very next frame to Ian, were his first human travelling companions. He hadn't liked humans back then, he remembered. He hadn't wanted them on board and had almost stranded them once, they became so annoying. He still remembered dragging Ian towards the TARDIS doors to throw him out, where now he couldn't remember but at the time he knew he hadn't cared. But, Susan liked had them and defended them from him, they had been her teachers at the school she had insisted on enrolling in and, over time, the Doctor had grown to like them too. Their bravery, loyalty and resourcefulness had eventually won him over and he'd been travelling with humans ever since.

He grinned at the paintings. So long ago now. Ian and Barbara had married when they left him and had had a son. He had been very pleased to hear about that.

The rest of the paintings on both sides of the hall were similar, they were all portraits of people who he'd travelled with or had become close to. Or at least, as close as he ever could get to creatures that barely made it to eighty.

Slowly he walked down the hall, becoming sadder with each passing portrait and, not for the first time, pondered that maybe Timelords lived for too long. There were a lot of faces, all of them smiling back at him with fondness. He remembered them, each and every one, but there were some he knew he would never see again. Their time had passed and as much as he would like, he couldn't go back along the time lines, not even for a short visit.

When he reached the door at the other end he could feel a tear trickling down his cheek. Again there was that sinister chuckle followed by that soft voice purring in his ear "Why so sad my dear Doctor? What ails your mind? What breaks your hearts? Perhaps, it is better to be alone after all."

He made a face of distaste and glanced behind him to find nothing, just the sound of the disembodied chuckling again. Turning back, he twisted the knob and opened the next room.

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><p><em>Please review if you like or dislike so I may improve or stop wasting my time writing a fic that no one is interested in.<em>


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